Welcome to my new, bi-weekly email newsletter Magnitude and Direction. Inspired and frequently fed by some of my favorite regular email newsletters (The Download from MIT Tech Review, The Prepared from Spencer Wright, and The Monday Morning Macro from Y Combinator to name a few), this will be a place where I share interesting articles, links, and downloads from a variety of subject areas that I have experience and interest in.

Thanks for signing up and if you ever have something cool you want to share, feel free to reach out!

Hardware, Prototyping, and Fabrication

I saw Lisa Neigut's clock for the phases of the moon a few weeks ago in The Prepared and had to re-post the fabrication instructions here. She's gearing up to launch a Kickstarter campaign for the project too.

If you like crazy intricate CNC machining, you need to follow 5thaxis on Instagram.

Half the designs on Thingiverse are riffs on previous designs.

Software and Programming

Anthony Chen from Carnegie Mellon has developed a new design software called Forte, which let's anyone easily take advantage of algorithmic design. Check out some design examples here.

Interactive Dynamic Video is, more or less, exactly what it sounds like: the ability to interact with the objects in videos.

Science, Engineering, and Biomedicine

Miniature robots can lengthen stunted tubular organs through traction force, without the need for a medically-induced coma, a requirement for the current clinical procedure.

The principles of programmable matter have been applied to drug-releasing hydrogels.

Have you ever wanted to 3D print a real dinosaur skull? Well, now you can.

Mapping and Data Science

The Welikia Project shows what the island of Manhattan looked like when European colonists first arrived in 1609.

Where are the Voyagers?

Turns out there are probably more trees in New York City than you'd think. It also turns out there are a lot of different varieties.

Events and Opportunities

The next two weeks are going to be jam-packed with interesting events. Here's just a few of them:

The next Monthly Music Hackathon at Spotify will be on Saturday, March 10th and will focus on Music AcessAbility.
The Brooklyn Historical Society is having it's next Free Friday on March 9th.
The New York City BioPharma Networking Group (or NYCBPNG) is having its next meeting on Tuesday, March 13th.
NYC Open Data Week starts today! There are tons of events - too many to list here - but you can find them all at this link.
CCNY's Zahn Innovation Center is having their first ever Innovation Summit this coming Tuesday, March 6th.
and last, but not least, the first annual Washington Heights Jazz Festivalis happening from March 9th to March 11th at various venues uptown.

Map of the Month

A 3D, whole-earth model of current weather conditions. This is one of the most mesmerizing maps I've ever come across.

Odds & Ends

When it comes to determining obviousness in a patent application, a person of ordinary skill in the art is not just an automation.